AuthorTopic: Help wanted to transcribe a George III era journal (Read 2709 times)

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The RNRA has recently acquired the journal of the Reverend William Elliot, RN Chaplin, which covers his time aboard H.M.S. DONEGAL from May 1808 to Jan 1813. This is in the form of a notebook in which daily entries are recorded until the end of July 1810, from then on entries are shorter and at infrequent intervals.

Since this is hand written in flowing script, having the contents transcribed and presented as a text document will allow anyone to browse its contents without having to struggle to decipher his handwriting. To this end the RNRA would like to ask for volunteers to tackle this job. The journal has been scanned and saved as a PDF file which be accessed from this link.http://www.royalnavyresearcharchive.org.uk/PDF_files/Rev_William_Elliot_Journal_s.pdf

I noticed on some of the pages that the writing on the next is showing.

Is it possible to put a sheet of black paper under the next page and then rescan?

Hi Rick

The issue is due to the ink bleeding through the 17th century paper.You might notice that some pages have very dark, strong ink while others have lighter, faded ink. So basically the shadow text is not a product of the scanning process and can't be avoided.

For those wondering what to expect from the journal here is a brief summary of activities of HMS DONEGAL during the period covered in the journal.

At the time that the Rev William Elliot joined the DONEGAL she was under the command of Captain Pulteney Malcolm (having transferred to her from HMS RENOWN in 1805), and in 1808 she was engaged in convoying troops to the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars. Capt. Malcolm oversaw the debarkation of Sir Arthur Wellesley's army at Mondego Bay, Portugal from 1 August till the 5th.

In 1809 the DONEGAL was attached to the Channel Fleet, under Lord Gambier, and took part in the battle of the Basque Roads, off the Island of Aix on the night of April 11th.

In November 1810 Captain Malcolm led an attack on a French frigate squadron anchored at Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue at the Action of 15 November 1810, which ultimately led to the destruction of the French frigate ELISA.

The DONEGAL was paid off in 1811 and laid up at Portsmouth. Moving to Chatham in 1814 She was finally broken up in May 1845.